The 80-year-old Italian star is viewed as one of the industry's classic beauties, alongside the likes of late actresses Audrey Hepburn, Grace Kelly and Marilyn Monroe.

Her dark brown eyes and plump nude lips have become recognisable over the years, and it's all thanks to her cosmetics skills.

"My favourite make-up artist is me. I always did my own make-up since I own myself, and I want to be what I want to be," she told the Wall Street Journal. "I want to show people what I really am. So the hair, the eyes, the lipstick - I did it all myself.

"The first lipstick I ever wore was made of geraniums. I was 13. Back then, I was not really thinking a lot about lipstick. I was thinking: ‘What am I going to eat tomorrow?’ But in Pozzuoli [a small town outside Naples], we had a very nice garden with a lot of geraniums. And they have these parts, in pink and dark red. I used to squash them to my lips."

With her make-up knowledge, it's no surprise Sophia has landed a beauty campaign with Dolce & Gabbana, in which she rocks a cherry-red lip colour called Sophia Loren No.1. The product is a collaboration between the star and designer duo Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana, and it took some experimentation to perfect.

"One challenge in making this new lipstick was my lips. They are very dark," Sophia explained. "So when we worked together to find the right shade, we had to make sure that when you put it on my lips it showed the shade we were looking for."

It also marks her first ever fashion ad, as although she's been asked to do many in the past, her mind had always been on acting.